Hello!
First off, I’ve struggled to exercise, and I also have ADHD. Gamifying exercise works really well for my dopamine-craving brain, but I’m also easily distracted, so the current mobile fitness games on the market didn’t really work for me. That’s how I came up with this idea.
Here are some info about the game and how it’s different from Pokemon Go for example:
- no distractions. I love games that value my time. WalkScape is designed so that it encourages you not to open it while you’re walking, but afterwards. And even if you open it while walking, changing things in the game is super quick.
- no GPS. So you can walk where ever you want. The game tracks your steps even without an internet connection, but you need a connection when you open the game.
- no ads, no MTX. I hate predatory monetisation practises, and they encourage unhealthy spending habits. This game is about both mental and physical health.
In the game, you explore and work in different skills such as woodcutting, foraging, fishing and crafting by walking in real life. The game uses your phone’s pedometer to track your progress. It’s also online, so you can work with your friends towards common goals without needing to be physically in the same location.
The game has dozens of locations, hundreds of items, NPCs, shops and more is coming as I work towards the full release of the game. There’s a lot of different unique and cute activities in the game you can set your character to do in addition to the typical woodcutting and mining, like volunteering in soup kitchen or helping locals repairing their boats. All fueled by walking IRL.
If you feel like you’d like to try it out, you can either apply to the closed beta (we’re inviting more people right now) or if you like to support the development, you get instant to access through Patreon or Buy me a Coffee to start playing. The game is completely community funded.
Whether you decide to support or apply to the closed beta, you’ll need to sign up at WalkScape Portal to the game and then apply or connect your Patreon on the account page.
You can also check our this video to hear me and the artist explain more about the game: Youtube introduction video
Or you can visit the website.
We also have my devblogs released every two weeks available at https://portal.walkscape.app/development
It’s been a wild journey for me growing this thing from my personal hobby project, and awesome to see the game helping so many people to exercise more. I’ll answer any questions you might have in the comments!
Stay hydrated, and keep walking ❤️
Definitely trying this one out. I’ve been a daily POGO player since launch because it gets me outside walking around. I liked how Pikmin Bloom had the passive pedometer angle, but it also had to constantly check GPS, so it was a battery hog.
I’d definitely benefit from Google Fit integration since I like to use the elliptical while wearing my watch. But I’d still get plenty of distance with just pedometer. Least of which because I’ll already be playing POGO.
Hey, this looks really interesting! I am looking forward to trying it. I just bought you a coffee and connected BMAC to my account. Do I also need to apply to the beta to get access?
Edit: I just got the mail for the beta access without additionally applying for it.
You’ll need to sign in with your Google account that you use on Google Play and then press join group. This requirement is Google’s one for how they organize closed betas through Google Play. After that you’ll be able to see WalkScape in Google Play via the link provided in download instructions.
I just did that, but it still does not let me join and says the same.
Edit: Now the button to join the group suddenly shows up after trying several times.
Yeah Google Groups is a bit janky, sadly I can’t do anything about that.
When you say “apply to the closed beta”, where do you want people to apply?
- Sign up to the Portal https://portal.walkscape.app
- Click your profile pic to get to account page
- Press apply to beta
This is a neat idea. I never exercised more than when I played Pokemon Go.
Joined the closed beta yesterday and the game seems very nice,however I’m not sure how the step counter works. In Statistics,at least , they are way off,by thousands of steps.
Edit: typo
@hornedfiend @schamppu I think the game is set to medium sensitivity, or Low. There are some fitness apps with a sensitivity setting, and if you place it high, it is more accurate. The problem arises if you’re just moving your phone, since it’s high sensitivity, it counts those as steps. So, most apps have it at medium or Low. That’s my guest at least.
Wonder if it would be good to add a “actively walking” mode that’s in a convenient place and just turns up the sensitivity for a while
@trashgirlfriend I remembered, #Walkr, a space gamification fitness app, have an option to “boost” steps when you’re about to go on a long walk/run/jumping rope session. You can use it once every 24 hours only (and only lasts for 2 hours IIRC).
I think, now that you suggested it, that was maybe their solution to keeping the sensitivity fixed for their game, but giving users a chance to earn more if they’re about to engage in a long session.
🤔
@trashgirlfriend Ooh. I like that! It could be a widget too for easy access.
Sold 👀
Hey there, it sounds like a very cool project.
I received my confirmation email but when I click accept the invite, it just takes me to the main page, but I still can’t log in or confirm my account.
I’m using the same username as on lemmy, Varyk
Yeah, I’m aware of this issue and have been trying to find time to look fix it, but it’s relatively rare. It’s something wrong with cookies. Usually fixed after either clearing cookies from the Portal, or trying a different browser. Let me know if it works or not!
Thanks, I just checked.
I’ve used chrome and duckduckgo on my Android, then Firefox and opera on my linux laptop, than chrome, edge and Opera on my windows 10 laptop.
I get taken straight to the main page on my Android and on the windows machine, but on the browsers using my Linux laptop, I receive the error message " application error: a client side exception has occurred. (See the browser console for more information. )."
Is there any other prerequisite I might have looked over before I’m supposed to click on that accept the invite link?
Thanks.
Nope, that should be all. You can contact me with the email you signed up on contact@walkscape.app and I’ll sort it out for you
Send, thank you, and of course take your time.
Same issue, kinda bummed
I’m having the same issue here.I was hitting the website link in the email rather than the verify link.
I was just looking for a game like this earlier today. This is perfect!
Thank you so much <3!
The game tracks your steps even without an internet connection, but you need a connection when you open the game.
Could you elaborate on the reasons why?
It’s an online game, with option for single player coming later. We run anti-cheat and cloud save your progress when you open it up, plus validate that you’re running on the most recent version of the game so you can’t be exploiting old game balance etc. found in previous versions.
run anti-cheat
Isn’t that next to impossible in mobile games like this?
Some are very easy depending on how the game works (at least on android). E.g. when pokemon go came out you could just go to developer settings (in android settings) and change your location to wherever you wanted.
Another super easy one is changing the time to get around timegated games.
But it just might work… for us.
Why would it be? From pedometer and sensor data, it’s quite easy to determine if someone is cheating or not.
I’ve been consistently hiking for a couple months now and I don’t always enjoy it. I’ll try this out and see if I can change my perspective! Thanks!
Will it be able to use my watch to track steps?
Watch support is coming later on when we add integrations with Google Fit and Apple Health, but at the moment not supported. Only phone’s pedometer is now counted for
Ah, my watch isn’t Google anyway, so that’s a shame. Still a cool game, and I’m sure I could play it without watch support.
Google Fit supports almost every watch out there. Garmin, Fitbit, Samsung etc. all should work through it.
Really? I thought it was only watches running Google watch OS, which I didn’t get for battery life reasons. I wonder if my Hauwei GT2 is supported.
I have original Huawei GT watch, worked great with Google Fit!
Can confirm that almost all watches that work with Android can just link with Google fit
It amuses me that my first thought was that this would be great for ADHDers like myself and then it turns out thats why you created it lol
Haha :D ADHD minds think alike I guess
Would love to support, but it seems like everything is full up. I’ll check back a little ways down the road.
What do you mean full up?
Alright, I’ve signed up as a supporter, looking forward to digging in. Thanks!
… I’m a dumb. I just skimmed, saw the date and assumed it would be full. It is not, however, after March 31st. I’ll edit the original post.
I applied for the beta today and got accepted straight away. I love the look of this game and will be using it to get me to walk out more.
First impressions are good, the game is very polished and you can see that the creators really take their time with things, the level of detail is insane.
The game seems easy to pick up and I am looking forward to following it’s development closely.
Thank you so much, this comment made me smile <3! I’ve been accepting more people today, and I’m very glad to hear you’re enjoying it.
I’m the type of game dev who tends to be very perfectionist even on small things, and also this project started off as a passion hobby project, which hopefully shows! We’ve poured a lot of love and care to the game. Because of the high level polish I’ve seen that many people already tend to look at it as a “final product”, even though we’ve only been able to implement the core gameplay loop.
This is looking really cool! I’m really interested in trying it out.
Since you mentioned Garmin Connect in this thread, I would like to throw in my five cents too. I’m in the Garmin ecosystem for my fitness tracking devices, so it would be amazing if the game could get my step counts from Garmin Connect, since that’s where I’m collecting them anyway, and lugging my phone around to do the step counting can be a bit cumbersome. But if the game is fun enough, I guess it’s not a dealbreaker for the time being!
Depending on how easy Garmin Connect is to implement, it’s probably eventually going to be supported. I know we have a lot of people in the community with Garmins, but Google Fit integration should also when added already allow Garmins to be used for progress in game. But of course, using Gamin Connect would be handier.
Another +1 for Garmin connect!
I’ve got a whole family of Garmins (plus one apple) looking for a walking game and this seems right up our alley. +1 for Garmin Connect integration!
